To Reason Why
by Sophia Hawkins
Summary: What's the point in starting a fight you're almost guaranteed to lose? Sometimes it's the only right thing to do. A teenaged girl's visit to the precinct proves an eye opener for the officers involved. Chapter 3 is now up.
1. Chapter 1

To Reason Why

"Freeze, hairball!" Mick Belker hollered after the crook he was chasing down the street on foot. Of course the thief he was in hot pursuit of was too stubborn to do the smart thing and actually comply.

For two weeks he'd been undercover on assignment. A string of broad daylight robberies out in plain sight, and all of them within the same general vicinity. Nothing you could set your watch by, but everybody knew the where and a rough idea of when, all the same, despite the public's best attempts, nobody seemed to be able to effectively anticipate where or what this guy would do next. Every single time the police were notified, they always showed up just in time to be too late to do much of anything except take statements and descriptions and offer the age-old empty promise of they'd do everything to find the guy. Of course they'd do everything, but with no more than they had to run on, nothing would ever come of it, and everybody knew it. So Belker had been put on the streets undercover, wandering aimlessly around the hot zone waiting for any sign of something wrong going on. Finally it had paid off today when he spotted a young thug who looked like a reform school dropout, brazenly come up to a woman, cut the strap off her purse and take off with it, and that was where Mick had come into this current 100 yard dash.

The chase continued, and Belker followed the guy around two corners, down a back alley, and around onto the next street.

Belker wasn't the _only_ cop currently involved in an on-foot chase. A couple streets over and a couple blocks down, Bobby Hill and Andy Renko had their hands full in pursuit of a couple other guys they'd spotted while being out on patrol for the morning.

"Police, freeze!" Bobby called over the two young gang members who had been caught red-handed vandalizing public property, and bolted when they knew the cops were onto them.

"They never listen," Renko said as they chased the two hoodlums down a one way street and, around a corner and down an alleyway.

"Can't say we didn't warn them!" Bobby replied over his huffing and puffing as they continued to sprint after the two young hoods.

The two 17-year-olds rounded the corner, and Bobby and Renko followed right after them.

What happened next was seven people colliding and all of them falling down like bowling pins in the middle of the street.

What happened happened so quickly, all Bobby and Renko knew was one minute they were still in pursuit on foot, and next they were tangled up over each other on the pavement, they never even knew what hit them. They started to get up and saw the two kids also sprawled on the street, and over to the other side, Belker had recovered from his own spill to jump on his thief and pin the man to the ground, and in between all of them was a young woman flat on her back with her jean-clad legs high in the air, and both arms wrapped over her stomach as she moaned in pain from being knocked down.

"Cowboy, deal with these two," Bobby said as he moved over to assist the woman.

"On your feet, dirt bag," Belker told the thief as he forced the man up, with both hands cuffed behind his back.

"Hey Belker," Renko said as a light bulb went on over his head, "Why don't you bring your guy over here with mine? I got an idea."

Bobby stepped around the men and knelt down to see the woman laying on the ground in pain. She wasn't very old, maybe late teens, maybe early 20s, he didn't know. She was dressed in a second-hand jean jacket, and blue jeans that didn't quite match the jacket, and worn out sneakers, her hair was brown and thin, a dirty bandana tied around her forehead, her face contorted in pain as she continued to moan and groan, though she had no immediately visible injuries to her.

"Miss, are you seriously hurt?" he asked her as he knelt down by her, "Miss, can you tell me who you are?" She seemed to be ignoring him, he tried again before he made the call if they needed to bring in an ambulance for her, "Miss, do you know if you can get up?"

The groans subsided slightly and she told him weakly, "I can get up…my back's killing me."

"No wonder falling flat on the…" Bobby's comment died on his lips as he saw the young woman lower her legs and press her feet against the ground to stand up, and took her hands off her stomach, revealing a noticeable bulge through her T-shirt.

"Street," Bobby finally got the final word out.

Renko had just finished cuffing Belker's thief to one of his vandals, and the other wrist of that vandal to the wrist of his accomplice, and when the two cops were satisfied none of their perps would be getting away anytime soon, they turned their attention likewise to the young woman, and were both taken aback by this new and sudden revelation.

"You're, uh…"

"I'm alright," she insisted as she brushed off the front of her jeans, "I'm alright."

"Are you sure?" Bobby asked, "We can get you to a doctor."

She shook her head, "I don't need a doctor…what happened?"

"What happened is you just helped us catch three criminals," Belker said, true to form not letting too much readable emotion show through, but a hint of impress was evident in his tone.

"Miss," Renko said to her, "We are truly sorry for this little mishap, and if there's anything that we can do…"

"You're cops? There might be one thing you could do to help me," she said, "Can I get a ride to the police station? I need to see somebody about filing a report."

"Ah…yeah," Bobby looked to his partner and Belker semi-questioningly, "Sure, we can arrange that."

"Thank you," she said, "I was just on my way there."

"No problem, we'll need to be taking a statement from you on what just happened anyway. We'll just get the 3 Stooges here settled in the back of our car, and…" Renko trailed off when he saw that Belker was looking back the way they'd come, "What is it?"

"Make room in the back for one more hairball," Belker told him, and nodded toward the street they'd just come running down.

Belker's usual thief, a tall, bald with a goatee, black man in a trench coat, always hauled in with different loot, always with a different name, and at it again. Belker went to cut the man off and apprehend him _again_.

"What's going on?" the woman asked, "Is that a dangerous criminal?"

"Not hardly," Renko replied with a half smile, then turned to Bobby and added, "I don't _think_, anyway."

"So what is it you need to file a report about, Miss…" Bobby started to say.

"My name," the young woman replied as she looked around the surrounding area, "Is Patrice Lambert."

"I'm Andy Renko," Hill's partner introduced himself, "My friends call me Cowboy, and this here's my partner, Bobby Hill."

"And what do his friends call him?" she asked smartly.

"And," Renko pointed up the street, "That gentleman that just took off is Mick Belker, also in our squad."

"Nice to meet you," the girl said through a forced smile.

"How old are you, Patrice?" Bobby felt a need to ask.

"I'm 16," she answered as she bent over and picked up a hardback book she'd presumably dropped during the collision.

"Uh huh…" Bobby felt like they'd taken a wrong turn at the Twilight Zone during the chase, "And…what is it that you…"

"Freeze, dog breath!" they heard Belker yell up the street, and turned to see the tall black man in the trench coat running trying to get away from the cop.

Patrice was still crouched down from getting her book and the man didn't see her as he came running, and he tripped over her and fell flat on the ground. Patrice recovered from being kicked when he hit her, and before he could get up, she slid over towards him and grabbed him by the back of his shirt under his coat.

"Oh ho, a thief, eh?" she asked, and pressed her weight against the man by sitting on him, and told him, "I'm placing you on citizen's arrest until one of these cops gets around to officiating it."

"Hey Belker, you almost lost him!" Bobby told Mick as he caught up with the rest of them.

"Search him!" Belker told them, "I know he's got _something_!" Impatiently, he walked over to the man and patted down his back and told him, "On your _feet_, hairball!"

Reluctantly, the man stood up, and was searched, and was found to be in possession of 7 different wallets.

"This guy's a regular overachiever, isn't he?" Renko asked.

"Alright, let's get him cuffed, and figure out how we're going to fit everybody in our car," Bobby said.

"If you need to," Patrice told him, "You can take them all first and come back…I'll wait."

"Bobby," Renko said to his partner, "I got an idea."

"What is it, Cowboy?" Bobby asked.

Renko leaned over towards his partner and suggested, "Why don't we get on our radio and have _another_ patrol car come and escort her to the Hill? I mean _everybody_ can't be having as exciting a day as _we_ are, right?"

Bobby considered it and said, "Maybe we can get Bates and Coffey to come, be better to have another woman with her."

Renko nodded, "We can hardly say it's not important, she just helped us catch _four_ crooks, surely that's worthy of a little VIP treatment, right?"

Bobby grinned a little and told his partner, "I like the way you think, Cowboy." He turned towards Belker and told him, "Hey Belker, keep an eye on everybody, we're going to call in some backup for an escort."

"Go ahead," Belker told him as he tested the cuffs on his recurring klepto to make sure the man couldn't slip out of them and take off at a moment's notice, "I got my eye on _this_ one."

"Hey man," the klepto said to Belker, "I want my wallet back, you can't keep a man's private property."

"Oh yeah?" Belker asked, bordering on growling, "Look dirt bag, we just took _seven_ wallets off of you…" he flashed an unnerving little smile and asked the man, "Which one's yours?"

"All of them," the man answered with a straight face.

"All of them," Belker growled in repeat, "_All_ of them."


	2. Chapter 2

Another typical day for the Hill Street precinct, typical for the people who frequented it everyday anyway, but to someone like Patrice Lambert, it was a sensory overload: people everywhere, phones ringing every time she turned around, constant incoherent chatter every which way, uniforms talking to higher ranks, suspects talking to cops, victims speaking with police and lawyers, Grand Central Station couldn't possibly be this busy.

"So what should I do?" she asked.

"Why don't you just find a place to sit down and we'll get to you in a few minutes?" Bobby suggested.

A place to sit down, _where_? The whole place seemed to be jam packed. She looked around one way and the other, and finally found one vacant seat at one desk, completely ignoring the man standing near it who was yelling at one of the officers.

"I want to see Furillo!" Patrice stepped around the short man in blue jeans and a semi-matching studded jacket and a red cap, who proceeded to pound the officer's desk and told him, "He ain't here, that's _fine!_ I gonna wait _right_ here till he gets back!" And with that, Jesus Martinez sat down, and fell flat on the floor.

"Hey!" he looked back to see what happened to his chair, and saw it being relocated to Belker's desk alongside the pickpocket. Jesus got to his feet and went over to the other desk and said to the girl, "Hey, that's my chair!"

"Does it have your name on it?" she asked.

"No."

"Then it's up for grabs," she told him, and doing a slight double take, asked him, "What _is_ your name anyway?"

Jesus did a little posturing as he introduced himself, "Jesus Martinez."

"Hey-Zeus?" Patrice repeated, "What kind of a name is that?"

"Hey," he told her, "It's the name of a _legend_."

The look she gave him in response explicitly spelled out that she doubted it.

"And what's _your_ name, Mama?" Jesus asked her, staring her down.

Patrice pushed the chair back and stood up, revealing she was slightly taller than he was, and for gain, she hiked one foot up on the chair to give her leverage as she returned the death stare, and told him, "Patrice Lambert," and continued to stare him down in return.

Jesus turned up his top lip slightly and after a few seconds' pause, nodded his head slightly and remarked, "That's cute, I like it," and promptly turned and went to find another place to wait for Frank to return.

Belker ran a new sheet of paper into his typewriter and inflicted his own death stare at the criminal seated across from him at the desk and commanded in a word of one syllable, "Name?"

His thief kept a straight eyes forward composure and said in a deadpanned tone, "Rufus T. Firefly."

Belker turned and glared at the man through the corner of his eye and growled at him. His phone rang and he picked up the receiver and said in a somewhat gruff tone, "Belker," and after a couple seconds his shoulders drooped and he came down a notch and added in a softer tone, "Hi, Ma."

Patrice sat back and alternated between watching Belker talk to his mother, and the thief handcuffed in the chair who observed the conversation and laughed at it, and Belker's occasional turn towards him and growl like a dog about to bite.

15 minutes later, Renko came over towards her chair and said to her, "Alright, Patrice, if you want to come over here now, we'll take your statement to complete this jigsaw puzzle so these guys' defense attorney can't get this case thrown out on grounds of withholding anything."

"I don't have a statement," she told him.

"I know, but you were there, so we just need you to tell us what happened," Renko said.

"_You_ know what happened, _you_ were there too, _you're_ the ones that ran into me, _remember_?" Patrice asked.

Renko managed to maintain a straight face and he told her, "I know that, Patrice, but we need you to come," he pointed to where his and Bobby's desks were, "Over there, and tell us what happened in your own words."

"Why?" she asked, "Don't you believe me," she pointed to Belker's desk, "Sitting over _here_?"

Renko's straight face didn't last long, and feeling the air of defeat, he swung his arm in a gesture like he was getting ready to toss a bowling ball, in the general direction of his desk, and said to her, "Would you _please_ just come over here and give us an account in your own words?"

She shrugged and stood up and followed him over to the other side of the squad room.

"What can I tell you?" she asked, "I was on my way here and you all came running around from both corners and _knocked_ into me, that's all."

"Yeah we know," Bobby told her, "But defense attorneys love to act like any miniscule detail left out is some big conspiracy to bootstrap their clients, so we gotta have all stones turned, in quintuplet."

"And let me get this straight," Patrice adjusted in her chair, "Since you guys were chasing different crooks than that guy," she pointed to Belker, "Once I get done telling _you_ what you already know, I have to go over there and tell him the exact same thing?"

"Actually it'd be better if you wrote it out for the records," Bobby told her.

She took the legal pad and pen from Hill and bent over it to start writing, then she looked up at him and asked, "_When_ can I see somebody about filing my report?"

"Is it an urgent matter?" Bobby asked.

"Yes," she said.

"As in this minute?" he asked.

She shook her head.

"Then somebody can help you with that _after_ we get this done, we've got a clock running on these guys and the sooner we can get everything wrapped up here, the sooner we can take them to the court and let them figure out what to do with them."

"I see." A thought occurred to her and she asked Bobby, "What'd you say your name was?"

"My name? Bobby Hill."

Patrice started laughing, Bobby felt it was a joke he wasn't in on.

"What's so funny?" he asked.

"Just that they call _this_ place the Hill," she said, "And _your_ name is Hill, so they've got a Hill working _on_ the Hill. That's funny."

Bobby looked over to his partner, and using his pencil in place of his index finger, twirled it by his ear to give an opinion of what he thought of the girl thus far.

Waiting for her presence to be required over at Belker's desk, Patrice reached inside of her jacket and pulled out the book she'd dropped before, Renko leaned over the desk and read the title upside down, "The Murder Trial of Judge Peel…that for a school assignment, a book report or something? Or is that for a civics class?"

"No," she answered as she opened it and skimmed through it.

Bobby couldn't help asking, "What's it for then?"

"Blocking guard," she answered, and stood up to explain by holding it in front of her stomach, "I'd heard you guys running my way and I didn't have time to see what was going on, so I just…well, a little extra protection, you know?"

"Interesting idea."

It was the first time since they'd run into this girl that she seemed to actually acknowledge her pregnancy, and she explained, "I know it's supposed to be every pregnant woman's instinct if something's coming in close contact, to do this," and wrapped her arms around her stomach, "But then I figured a nice sized, well placed hardback book would be just as handy, if not more practical, if somebody were to try punching me in the gut, they'd be more likely to hurt their hand on this than my hands, and I wouldn't be getting hurt in the process."

"So you just carry that with you wherever you go?" Renko asked.

"Just until I finish reading it, then I find another one about the same size, preferably I try to find a larger one though, thicker, more insulation."

"Might I suggest then you try War and Peace?" Renko asked in a joking manner.

Bobby thought of something and asked her, "Why _would_ they?"

"Why would who what?" she asked.

"Why would somebody try punching you in the stomach?" he asked.

Trying to be coy, she shrugged and said only, "I am _wildly_ unpopular at my school."

"Is that what you were coming here to file a report about?" Bobby asked, "Somebody at school giving you trouble?"

"Not exactly," Patrice replied, "Who do I see about…"

"Excuse me, Miss," Belker came over to them and said, "If you're ready to give me a statement, then we can get on with it."

"Oh, sure," she stood up and followed Belker back over to his desk.

Mick sat down and rolled a new sheet of paper into his typewriter, then thought of something and said to Patrice, "Today's Tuesday, isn't it?"

"All day last I checked," she replied.

Mick did a double take and offered a small growl for that remark.

"That mean today's a school day, doesn't it?"

"Suppose it does," Patrice replied.

"Okay then, why aren't you in school?" he asked.

"I had a note," she said.

Another double take, and Mick shook his head and said dryly, "Oh, cute."

She just shrugged in response.

"Hey listen," he said to her, "I'm _really_ sorry about what happened, but you helped us out a lot."

"Well, I guess there are some advantages to being the human speed bump," she replied.

"Hey Mick," Phil Esterhaus came over to Belker's desk and dropped a folder on it and told him, "Looks like we got an old case reopening, do you remember a couple years ago that guy who…"

"Sergeant," Belker never looked up from his typewriter as he nodded towards the girl sitting opposite him, "Say hello to the woman who helped us haul in three dirtballs at the same time."

"Oh!" Phil did a small double take at just seeing her now for the first time and offered his hand, "Phil Esterhaus."

"Patrice Lambert," she replied as she grabbed his hand and shook it.

"Nice to meet you." He turned his attention back to Belker and said, "Mick, when you get done with this, I need to see you, LaRue and Washington, we need to go over the details of you guys' next undercover assignment."

"Sure thing, Sergeant," Belker punched the keys on his typewriter, "Just as _soon_ as those two jokers actually get in."

"Where are they anyway?" Phil asked.

"They didn't tell me anything, that's all I know," Belker answered.

Esterhaus nodded slightly and made small sounds in the back of his throat of reluctant agreement.

"Just status quo around here?" Patrice asked Mick.

"Oh no," he answered, "Today's been kind of slow actually."

She turned in her chair and looked around at the precinct that was all hustle and bustle with people coming in and going out every which way, and for the life of her couldn't figure out what a busy day must've looked like.


	3. Chapter 3

Belker rolled a new sheet of paper into his typewriter and looked across the desk at Patrice and said to her, "Alright, what was this report you wanted to file?"

Patrice leaned back in her chair slightly and nervously twisted a curl of her hair around one finger and said hesitantly, "Well you see…uh…I want to know who I need to talk to about…I mean I…" she pointed back to the hustle and bustle of the squad room and said, "I just want to make sure my report doesn't get lost. So what's the best way to make sure my case gets attention, eh?"

"Miss," Belker said calmly to her, "You give me your report, I can give you my word I will give it the utmost attention…I mean you _saw_ how I work, any case I get, I go into it full force, I never rest until the case is settled…now, what is it you want to report?"

Just as Patrice opened her mouth to answer, the entire squad room filled up with a new and sudden ruckus. Everybody turned in their chairs and saw that a big, burly, unruly man brought in had gotten into a melee with two uniform officers _and_ Henry Goldblume and Ray Calletano, who were struggling to pull the man off the officers, and in the process just wound up in alternating headlocks. From where Patrice sat it was amusing to watch, until the man suddenly stumbled her way in an attempt to throw the officers off of him. Belker jumped over his desk, grabbed Patrice, pulled her out of the chair and they both fell back against the wall a split second before everything on and around Mick's desk was pulverized in the ambush.

Belker looked to Patrice and asked her, "Are you alright?"

She was by far shaken up by what had just happened, but nodded her head.

"Stay here," he told her, and getting a running start, lunged at the perp, grabbed him by the leg and bit the man's ankle, something the guy hadn't been able to foresee and therefore took him completely off guard, consequently making him lose his grip on the other officers, who ambushed _him_ in return, handcuffed him, and hauled him off to a cell.

"Sergeant," Belker said to Esterhaus, "What in the world was _that_?"

"If I had to guess, Mick," he replied calmly, "A perfect example of why _not_ to do PCP."

Belker made one of his little whimpering sighing noises as he pulled on his hair and commented, "I'm surrounded by lunatics!"

"I know the feeling," Patrice remarked.

While the squad room was slowly returned to normal as the addict was hauled off, the furniture put back as it was and anything broken discarded into the trash, Patrice made her way over to Esterhaus and said to him, "Hey Sergeant, tell me something, if I wanted to file a report, who's the guy in charge that report would go to? Who do I take my complaint to, to see that it gets immediate attention?"

"That would be Captain Furillo," Phil answered.

"Is he in?" Patrice asked.

"No," he answered, "But he should be in later."

"Does he have an office around here?" she asked.

"Yes," Phil pointed down the corridor, "Just over there."

"Well do you mind if I just wait there until he gets back and he can see me directly?" Patrice asked him, not bothering to wait for an answer and already walking down the hall, "I want to make sure he actually gets it."

Esterhaus just shrugged to himself and responded, "I suppose so."

* * *

A short while later, Fay Furillo made her presence known at Hill Street Station.

"Phil!" she called to Esterhaus, "Is Frank in? I have to speak to him right away about Frank Jr.'s school."

"I'm sorry, Fay, he's been out all morning and hasn't got back yet," he told her.

"He _would_," Fay was disgruntled, "This is just like him, I'm having a crisis regarding _his_ son and he's off doing, who knows what?"

"Is something the matter, Fay?" Phil asked, playing dumb and oblivious.

That took her back and calmed her down momentarily and made a small smile form on her face. "Phil, this has just been a bad time…I'm getting calls from Frank Jr.'s teachers, and the principal, I'm getting letters sent home by the PTA, and just when I get _one_ thing solved, I've got 10 more popping out at me. I really need to talk to Frank and try getting this figured out."

"I'm sympathetic, Fay, but like I said, Frank's not in," Phil told her.

"Oh…well that's alright, I have to talk to him, I'll just wait in his office until he gets back," she said.

For a moment, Phil forgot that Frank's office was already occupied, and when he remembered, he followed after her, "Fay, hold on a minute, there's something…"

But Fay was already at the office and opened the door and saw somebody sitting in Frank's chair, turned to face away from the door.

"Frank!" Fay marched over to the chair, "Frank, you've got some nerve blowing me off. I need to _talk_ to you!" She grabbed the arm of the chair and made it spin around.

Then Fay Furillo screamed at the top of her lungs. Slumped back in Frank Furillo's chair was a teenaged girl, unresponsive, with blood coating the lower half of her face.

* * *

Patrice scrubbed her upper lip with a wet paper towel from the rest room and she told Fay, "I've been having nosebleeds since I was 8 years old, this is nothing new, but it's the first time I ever had one _while_ I was asleep."

Fay just shook her head in awe and told the girl, "If my son had that happen to him, let alone on a regular basis, I think I'd lose my mind."

"It's not so bad once you get used to it, the first ones are scary as hell," Patrice told her as she pitched the paper towel into the wastebasket along with the five others she'd used to clean up her face.

"Do you use anything?" Fay asked her.

"Like what?"

"I don't know, maybe petroleum jelly?" Fay suggested. Patrice looked at her curiously. "You know, the stuff you use to take off makeup?" The girl looked at her even more confusedly, so Fay tried again with a reference the girl might actually get, "Or…to put on your face so you don't get scratched in a fight?"

"I don't have any," Patrice told her.

"You should get some," Fay said, "It works _wonders_. One of my girlfriends was telling me if you put it up your nose, it stops nosebleeds, _her_ son gets a lot of them too. _He_ gets in a lot of fights."

"I can relate to that," Patrice said.

"So…" Fay decided to address the elephant in the room, "You're pregnant."

"How did you guess?" Patrice asked lightly.

"Are you married?" Fay asked her.

Patrice shook her head, "Nope, not married."

"Ah, yeah, well," Fay told her, "I know even today it's not seen as the morally responsible thing to do, but I'm starting to think maybe single women who have kids are smarter for it, you don't have to get divorced and then you don't have to keep calling your husband because the alimony and the child support are late…and your son's teachers keep calling with a new problem every other week…and your new boyfriend who's a psychologist says your ex-husband has reprehensibly damaged your son's mental wellbeing…"

"Boy you sure know how to sweeten the pot, don't you?" Patrice asked.

"Oh," Fay finally caught herself, "Don't mind me, I'm sure you and your boyfriend must get along great."

"Actually he's not in the picture," Patrice answered.

"Oh, I see," Fay said, feeling like an idiot and wanting to crawl under a rock, "Well…"

Patrice got up from the chair and said, "I wonder what's keeping Furillo?"

"You and me both," Fay said as she followed Patrice out the door.

* * *

Just as the two women left Frank's office, Neal and J.D. had returned to the station and were talking amongst themselves as they headed down the corridor, _right_ before they almost walked smack into Patrice.

"Whoa, sorry," Neal said as he stepped to the side.

Patrice stormed between and past the two of them, too quick for either of them to get a good look at her. J.D. watched her walk away and honed his sights in on her and followed her back to the squad room.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you, J.D.," Neal warned his partner. For no more than the brief glimpse he got of Patrice, he got the feeling that she was _too_ young for LaRue.

Instead, J.D. just looked back at his partner smirking and told him, "Hey 'babe', watch the _master_ at work."

Neal stood back and just responded, "O_kay_, J.D."

Patrice sat down at a vacant desk and J.D. came up beside her, got her attention, she turned her head to the side to look at him and he said to her in what he tried to pass as his _suave_ tone no woman could resist, "I don't believe we've been formally introduced. The name's J.D. LaRue, what brings a gorgeous gal like you to a place like this?"

Patrice was more or less deadpanned as she answered, "You wouldn't want to know."

J.D. was oblivious to how she answered and just continued, "What do you say when the shift's over we get out of here and go someplace more…_cozy_?"

"I think…" Patrice swallowed and said as she pushed the chair back, "I think I'm going to puke," and she promptly got up and left to find the restroom. Her sudden response left J.D. standing in the middle of the room completely dumbstruck, and Neal, who was standing four feet behind him, laughing so hard he was almost choking.

"What the hell just happened?" J.D. asked cluelessly.

Neal got a hold of himself and told his partner, "Serves you right, lover, that's what you get for trying to rob the cradle."

* * *

Fay stood behind Patrice and held her hair back while the teen girl hovered on her knees over the toilet in the ladies' room. "Okay, breathe sweetie," she told Patrice, "Breathe, I _know_, I had morning sickness almost the whole time I was pregnant with my son, I thought it would _never_ go away, but it finally did." Patrice stopped heaving and Fay reached over and hit the lever to flush it, "Okay, good."

Patrice slowly got to her feet, exited the stall, went over to the sink and rinsed out her mouth.

"You know," she told Fay's reflection in the mirror, "If it wasn't for throwing up all day and night, I don't think I'd mind being pregnant at all."

Fay looked at Patrice's reflection and asked her, "Are you keeping the baby?"

Patrice weakly nodded, "I don't trust adoption, it's too much of a gamble that _maybe_ the kid will go to a good home, I want it to have the best one it can."

"I'm sure it will," Fay told her.

"I wish that Captain Furillo would hurry up and get back here," Patrice said, "I've got to talk to him, it's not that I don't think the other cops here are capable of taking my report, but I've seen how chaotic it is around here, I can't afford for my report to get lost under 20 other things."

"What is it you need to talk to Frank about?" Fay asked.

Patrice looked at her reflection and answered, "It's just something I need to speak to _him_ about, and I need to do it before I lose my nerve."

* * *

By the time Frank Furillo returned to the Hill, he was instantly bombarded from all sides as soon as he stepped in the front door, messages, reports, complaints, bad news, and that was just the good side of it all.

"Frank," Howard Hunter came up and walked alongside the police captain, "I'd like to talk with you about these new regulations EAT has received."

"Hey Furillo!" Jesus Martinez came up, "You and me got business, man! You lock up my guys, _we_ got a problem."

"Frank!" Fay came up to him, "I need to talk to you about Frank Jr.'s school."

"Frank," Ray came in on his left and walked with him, "We had some difficulties bringing in Hector Moran, he seems to have been high on something and two of our men were injured restraining him."

"What the hell's going on around here, Phil?" Frank asked Esterhaus, "I'm gone in court _one_ morning and everything's falling apart around here."

"And unfortunately, Francis," Phil told him as they walked towards his office, "I don't see things getting better anytime soon."

Before Furillo could reach his office, Patrice stood in front of the door and cut him off. "Are you Captain Furillo?"

"Yes," he answered, trying to maintain his composure but losing that battle quickly.

"The Captain Furillo who works here?" Patrice asked him.

"Yes, what is this about?" he wanted to know.

"My name is Patrice Lambert, I wanted to talk to you," Patrice started to say, but she was drowned out by the commotion of everyone else and everything else going on in the station house. Everybody was determined to make themselves heard above everyone else, _and_ all the phone calls, statements being taken and complaints being filed in the squad room.

Finally the voices jumbled together too much and Frank turned to the others and yelled at him, "Shut up! I will get to each of you soon enough, until then, take a number!" He turned to Patrice and asked her, "And what is it _you_ wanted?"

Patrice answered loud and clear to make sure she was heard, "I want to talk to you about arresting the son of a bitch who raped me and got me pregnant!"

Nothing could ever draw the constant traffic of the Hill to a stop, but that little announcement created a close second in which you could still hear a pin drop. Everybody within earshot: all the uniforms _and_ undercover officers turned at that and fell silent; throughout the station phones still rang and reports still came in about crimes elsewhere in the city. Somewhere in the squad room, somebody answered a phone, "Hill Street", but otherwise, as far as human voices went, the whole room fell to a deathly silence as they looked on in awe at the teenaged girl who had made this little announcement.


End file.
